Captain Rob Davison provides leadership for Worcester Sharks

Saturday

Apr 12, 2014 at 10:36 PMApr 13, 2014 at 2:19 PM

By Rich Garven TELEGRAM & GAZETTE STAFF

WORCESTER — The Worcester Sharks' locker room was typically lively following practice Thursday at the DCU Center, when Rob Davison quietly emerged from a side room holding a plate filled with fresh fruit and a single chicken tender.

Davison bent down over his stall and slowly cut the chicken into small pieces. Then he handed a plastic fork to his 4-year-old daughter.

It was lunch time, although Hazel would be dining alone this day as her 7-year-old brother, Sawyer, was still attending the Shrewsbury Montessori School.

"I think it's good for them," Davison said. "My father always took me to work. It was different because he worked in a factory, but I think it's important for them to see that I come to work and I work hard, and hopefully it will instill a good work ethic in them."

Workmanlike personifies Davison's play during his 14 seasons of professional hockey, eight of which have been spent in the San Jose organization since the Sharks drafted the rugged and reliable, stay-at-home defenseman in the fourth round in 1998.

Davison, whose NHL résumé includes 225 games, 20 points and 325 penalty minutes with the Sharks, New York Islanders, Vancouver Canucks, and New Jersey Devils, spent the previous two seasons skating in Austria and the Czech Republic before signing a one-year deal with San Jose in July.

Davison and his wife, Louisa, who have been together for 17 years and will celebrate their 10th wedding anniversary in June, were looking to return to North America. San Jose was seeking to add depth at the blue line and did so to the point Davison was assigned to Worcester, where he has spent the entire season.

His presence has been invaluable to the Sharks, who lost to the visiting Norfolk Admirals, 3-0, on Saturday night and now have two games remaining in the season, both at home next weekend.

The 6-foot-2, 215-pound Davison has collected three goals and five assists, dropped the gloves six times and picked up his teammates on countless occasions via his sound play and sage persona as team captain. In other words, he's been everything the Sharks had hoped for.

"He's hard to play against — he hasn't changed his style since I've known him," said coach Roy Sommer, whose association with Davison dates to the player's rookie season with the Kentucky Thoroughblades in 2000.

"He goes out there and does everything at a 100 percent. He doesn't cheat you at all. He's always positive, and he's been a good leader for us this year. He's done everything expected of him."

It's been a satisfying season for Davison in so many ways with the exception of one. The Sharks will not be one of the eight teams from the Eastern Conference invited to the AHL playoffs, for the fourth straight year.

"I've said all year I really like our team and the character we have in this group," Davison said. "Unfortunately, the season didn't go as well as we hoped, and we're not in the playoffs. But I've had a good experience here, and I like the city, and it's been good to us."

Davison will turn 34 on May 1. He should know by then whether San Jose intends to bring him back for at least another season or whether he'll again find himself a free agent in need of a team.

No matter how things turn out, Davison understands his hockey career is far closer to the end than the beginning. With that in mind, he has spent the season studying to become a firefighter.

Davison is taking part in a sixth-month program through the Professional Hockey Players Association in which he does his textbook work and takes tests online.

In the summer, he'll spend six weeks training at a firefighting facility at Pearson Airport in Toronto.

Once he becomes certified, he'll be eligible to work anywhere in North America.

"Down the road, I think it's important that every hockey player have a life after hockey," Davison said. "I'll have to find employment somewhere. So my wife and I discussed it and thought firefighting would be a good fit, being that it's a team kind of atmosphere, and that's something I've been doing my whole career."

In the meantime, Davison has other things on his plate — like getting his daughter to eat lunch. Seems super-adorable Hazel is more interested in playing with the bouncy balls in the exercise room than clearing her plate.

No need to guess who won this puck battle — think braids and blue eyes — as the Davison family made its way through another workday together.